Recent Trends in Inservice Education and Their Implications for the College Professor, with Particular Reference to the Teaching of Writing.

Brunetti, Gerald J.

Noting that the success of the Bay Area Writing Project and the National Writing Project derives largely from their involvement of classroom teachers and from collaboration between university professors and those teachers, this paper discusses recent California legislation that places significant power in the hands of teachers in determining staff development programs. The paper views this phenomenon as part of a nationwide shift of responsibility for teacher education from the colleges and universities to the schools themselves. While noting that this change is laudable in many respects, the paper contends that it effectively cuts off teachers from theoretical and research perspectives and from the philosophical, psychological, and historical insights that college professors can provide. The paper proposes a new model for inservice education based on the ideas of British educator Michael Eraut. It then discusses the model, which identifies the school rather than the school district or the individual teacher as the focal point for educational change and calls for an outside consultant, possibly a college professor, to work in a nondirective way with teachers in identifying needs, setting objectives, delineating resources that can be used for problem solving, determining solutions, implementing them, and evaluating their effectiveness. The paper provides an example in which this model was successfully implemented. (Author/FL)